


A Matter of Duty

by Allothi



Category: Merlin (BBC)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-03
Updated: 2010-12-03
Packaged: 2017-10-13 12:16:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/137243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allothi/pseuds/Allothi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur is sent to track down and kill a sorcerer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Matter of Duty

**Author's Note:**

> **Warnings:** Wee bit of violence, OC death.  
>   
> 
> This was mostly written way back when in the hiatus between seasons 1 and 2, and thus takes no account of anything post s1.
> 
> I owe immense thanks to lemniciate and the_moonmoth for beta-reading; also to stealingpennies for being the first person to look at this and for telling me it wasn't entirely dreadful, and to lassiterfics for moral support. <33333

They found the man taking shelter in an old hermit's hut built close to the cliff's edge, long-abandoned and part-collapsed. Arthur had seen it and felt that he knew this would be the place.

He and the small force he had with him had been following along the coast for some time, stopping occasionally to check amongst the herdsmen and women in the fields for anyone who had had sight of their quarry. Now, it was getting into the dusk, the moon shining large and pale above them as they rode, the sky a blue-grey slashed with purple in the west. The light seeped over the horizon, gradually more and more dim, and the landscape was emptied, the people gone, the herds led back to their pens when the sun first began to set. Arthur knew from their last enquiries that they were gaining, getting close; and there was no human figure anywhere in sight, for the miles in every direction that stretched out before him. Only the hermitage.

It stood stark against the empty scenery, with its greyish stones and grey, crumbling mortar, like an upgrowth of the jagged rocks below. Arthur thought, this was the place. And Merlin, riding at Arthur's side, had his eyes fixed. Perhaps he could even tell who was hidden within. Arthur considered asking, but did not. He thought that he could not risk being overheard; and that he would rather not force Merlin to think whether or not to lie to him.

It was a quiet time now, not yet late enough for the wild sounds of the night, too late for the brighter life-sounds of the day. The noise of low waves breaking against the side of the cliff took on an odd resonance, spreading through the air. The smell of sea and salt seemed stronger. The horses' hooves sounded louder than they had done in the afternoon. If the man _was_ so near ahead, the sound might already have reached him.

The hermitage's entrance was not in view. Arthur thought it faced almost directly away from them, to the north-east, along the inland incline of this stretch of coast. He could not entirely remember. In surveying his father's lands, he had been here enough times to know the place a little, but no more than that. The last time was maybe a year ago and Arthur had hurried his way through, wanting to be at the hunt, paying only half-attention to what he saw. He had been dreaming of the game he would kill, of deer and scores of birds and rabbits knotted at the feet; of carcasses of boars the size and weight of four, five, six strong men that he would bring home to earn his father's smiles.

They came close enough for Arthur to consider whether they should dismount and finish their approach on foot. But if the man fled now, from here they could easily catch him up and cut him down. So Arthur only slowed and signalled to his knights what they were to do. He made sure, by an exchange of looks with Laudine, that the girl, Edith, mounted behind her, was as ready and as little agitated as could be hoped. God, what an awful necessity that she be here. Arthur glanced at the hermitage compulsively, as if expecting to see someone outside the walls staring back at him. He looked to Merlin, whose face was now turned to his.

Quietly, Arthur said, "You should stop here."

"No," said Merlin.

"You _will_ stop here." It would be by far, far the best, the safest thing. Merlin would never do it -- Arthur knew, had even more or less agreed that Merlin would not -- but as Arthur began to see or think he saw how this would play out, what he wanted was to hold Merlin back.

"I'm not stopping anywhere," said Merlin. If only, for once in his life, he could damn well be ordered. Of course not. He wouldn't be Merlin.

"Remember your promise to me," Arthur said, and Merlin's gaze dropped, low.

"Yeah. I remember."

Very close now. Arthur slowed his horse further and turned inland, his path describing a curve, arcing around the hermitage, the others spreading out around him. As they progressed further and further round, he was struck with a sudden, wondering doubt as to whether there really was anyone there at all. They could have been following the wrong man for days. They could have been following no one at all, a ghost, any number of different men passing through this region of land, or a suggestion created by their own enquiries -- the peasants feeling that they _ought_ to have an answer. There might be no one in this wreck of a hut. Their quarry might be on the other side of the kingdom. In Mercia, even, or Sussex, or Kent. He might have been killed by a guard in one of the ports, and Arthur would hear tomorrow and never even see the man alive.

Arthur began to see the front of the building and saw, as he ought to have remembered, that whatever door there had once been was gone, an uneven, oblong hole in its place. The interior would be in shadow, whilst Arthur and his men would still be distinct in the darkening light. He slowed yet further, and had his men draw back a little.

The story of this place went that there had been a wandering holy man and healer who had cured a king's younger child from an incurable disease. The aged healer had asked for a small, sturdy abode in which to live out the last of his days overlooking the sea. Or in another version the king -- not a Pendragon but a native man, one of the last ancestral kings of Camelot -- had decided he would rather keep such an extraordinary person at a safe distance. Even back then, any suspicion of a taint of sorcery could sometimes make its object an outcast. As far as Arthur could tell from his reading and from the folk tales that overspilled with the wine and ale in his father's hall, his people had always had a strong, half-pragmatic distrust of magic. It could, of course, as Arthur knew, be used for evil.

The entrance came fully into view, earlier than expected -- it was turned further away from the sea than Arthur had thought. In a moment, he had glimpsed the darker shape amidst the shadow that meant that yes: there was a man inside. The knights dismounted, one by one -- only Tor remaining on horseback, ready, in case it became necessary to give chase. Hector and Gryflet readied their crossbows, Laudine her bow, all trained upon the figure. Cador and Aglovale stood with their swords in hand. Edith hung close to Laudine. Merlin dismounted, jaw set. The two squires, Tor's and Gryflet's, both dismounted and spread to the far edges of the group so that between them they had this side of the hut well encircled.

Arthur dismounted. He watched the dark shape and drew his sword. The man wasn't moving -- perhaps he was too afraid. Arthur looked again at Merlin.

"I'll be careful," Merlin said. It was not entirely what Arthur wanted to hear.

He felt a little wild, a little sick, as he ordered the man in the hermitage to come out into plain view and tried, at the same time, to keep watch on Merlin as best he could out of the corner of his eye. He understood the danger. He had tried to provide for it. He pushed fear out of his mind.

"I would advise you to come out," he said again to the shape in the darkness. "In silence, and with your arms apart. Otherwise, I shall order my men to shoot you where you stand."

And so the man came out. He was tall, with a shock of unkempt dark hair. In line with the description: but so would many men have been. He wore a dark-coloured cloak, spread out somewhat by his obediently outstretched arms.

Arthur saw Laudine give Edith a nudge, and Edith step forwards a little. She might have been trembling. Arthur still thought -- hoped -- she wouldn't lie or be rash. He remembered her proud insistence that she understood what needed to be done. Such a pale, slight creature. In the greying light she looked washed out, colourless, her pale hair almost white. Arthur wished they could see better -- wondered if she could see well enough to know. The moon now stood out with a faint, silvery brightness against the darkening shade of the sky.

"It's him," Edith said, and Arthur shivered. He sensed Merlin, still beside him, make some slight movement. He didn't think about it.

It seemed that in the same moment that Arthur gave the order to shoot, the man swung his arms forwards and set a fire burning before his palms. Merlin turned his face to the ground; and Arthur did not see but knew that his eyes were aglow. There was the twang of Laudine's bow and the sound of two crossbows firing. Arthur caught, up close, the cold, faint, grasslike note of a scent he was still learning to detect. The fire went out and the man ahead of them screamed something. Two crossbow bolts and one arrow curved in the air, off their course, and thunked harmlessly against the hermitage stonework.

 

Three days and two nights earlier, Arthur had woken a little before the sunrise. The light was just starting to filter into his room in an uncertain haze, picking out deeper shadows here and there, and describing blearily the shape of the windows on the floor before them. Arthur stretched and breathed deep -- breath weightening into a yawn that seeped through his body, wakefulness sinking in at a slow and lazy pace. At his side, Merlin, still unused to anything but his own narrow bed, slept narrowly, arms against his chest and covers tugged tight around him, his nose dipped down into the heat. All that was visible beyond the shape of him was a disorder of dark hair upon the pillow, and a glimpse of skin between the disagreeing tufts of his fringe. Arthur leant over and kissed the back of his head, before he set about excavating Merlin from his cocoon.

He first discovered face -- eyes, mouth, cheeks and breath, which Arthur leant close enough to feel upon his lips. Carefully, he then uncovered the slim column of Merlin's neck, the front hidden, the side creased in folds from the way Merlin was curled, the back covered in a soft, fine down. Arthur pressed a second kiss here, leaning with one arm at the other side of Merlin's frame, the mattress shifting slightly under the changed pressure of his weight. Arthur kissed the very corner of Merlin's mouth, his nose just bumping against Merlin's cheek, and Merlin stirred but seemed still to sleep. Arthur watched him. Then, in a single movement, he gave a quick tug upon the covers that set Merlin shivering into wakefulness, loosening them about him to let the coming morning in.

Merlin's eyes opened quick and blinked, and at first he frowned -- but then he rolled in towards Arthur's body and Arthur discovered his smile, as yet hazy and half-formed to match the light.

"S'early," Merlin said, as he pressed up against Arthur's chest. "S'cold," he added, by way of an explanation, as he pulled the cover back up over his face.

Arthur pulled it off again. "It's morning," he said. "Well. Just about. Half an hour or so until full dawn." Dawn would soon be followed by duty, of course. For now, though, they had time.

"Hrm." Merlin seemed to consider this, looking up at him, eyes scrunched and almost shutting. He rubbed a hand through Arthur's hair. "I see." He shuffled higher up the bed, so that they were on a level, and yawned in Arthur's face. " _Hhhhhhhrm._ "

Arthur knocked his forehead against Merlin's own. "Oi."

" _Oi_?" In perfectly-feigned innocent tones. "Oi, you woke me up. _Oi_." Merlin kissed Arthur's lips, very soft.

"A mistake, I now realise," Arthur said, following Merlin's mouth, feeling a smile spread deep and warm across his face. He touched his lips to Merlin's lower lip. "You have no idea how to show respect to your prince."

"Nope, none at all." Merlin rested his head back down on the pillow, facing Arthur and looking entirely too pleased with himself. "Never have, never will."

Arthur glowered at him, which had no effect. "I should have left you asleep," he said. He took Merlin's shoulder under his hand, pressed him onto his back, knelt over him and looked down upon his prey. "I have no idea what I wanted you up for."

"Yes, it's very mysterious," Merlin said.

"It can't have been anything important," Arthur told him, and reached for the hem of Merlin's nightshirt.

 

The summons came some time later, only a little before Arthur would have been getting up in any case. At the knock on the door, Merlin laughed, lazy and quiet.

"At least not _terrible_ timing," he said. He kissed Arthur's shoulder, smudging his lips against Arthur's skin.

"Could be better," Arthur said. Merlin's nose just brushed against his neck. Arthur felt something like a sigh swell up inside his chest. Merlin mouthed along his jaw, and -- the knock came again.

"You can wait for a moment!" Arthur said.

"Sire--" whoever it was (a man; one of the household servants, not a very senior one; Arthur thought he could picture the face) began.

"One. Moment," Arthur said; and thankfully there was silence.

Merlin closed his eyes. Arthur almost missed the slight glitter of gold around the corners, and the barest hint of something like crushed grass upon the air -- and perhaps he imagined the slight, soundless hum, magic whispering its name, and the heavy feeling in his limbs, as Merlin moved, blurring-fast, wrapping time around himself, whisking on a shift and dropping down to crouch at the far side of the bed from the door. He smirked up at Arthur, and Arthur was leaning down to him before he knew what he did. Merlin touched Arthur's cheek and raised his brows. Arthur hesitated a second before he sat himself up in bed. He rearranged the covers. He called out that the servant could enter, and the servant did.

He was there on Arthur's father's orders: Arthur's presence was required in the throne room as soon as possible. Further questioning revealed that someone had arrived at the castle not long before, with urgent news. Further than this, the servant either would not or could not tell.

"Should I attend to you, sire?" he asked. Of course, he was thinking that Arthur would want someone to help him dress and would not want to wait for his servant to be roused.

"No," said Arthur, a touch too quickly, forcing himself not to look down to where Merlin had hid. "I'll attend to myself."

"Sire--" It seemed like the beginning of a protest. Arthur cut the servant off:

"Unless there is anything else, you may go."

A bow, a taking-of-leave, the door closed, and Arthur listened to the sound of footsteps grow more and more faint. He took a breath. Merlin rose, at the side of the bed.

"Um. That was close," he said.

Arthur shrugged, aware that he did it awkwardly. He got out of bed.

"Maybe you should stop staying the night," he said. It would probably be for the best. For Merlin even more so than Arthur, given the risks.

"I won't, though," Merlin said. He went to fetch Arthur's clothes. "Red jacket or blue today?"

 

And somehow, this was the image that came to Arthur's mind, some little while later, in the throne room, receiving his father's orders. Merlin: one jacket in either hand, holding them up, mild, fond insolence all over his face. Merlin helping Arthur's jacket on -- the brown, in the end -- and patting him down and stepping away, for Arthur to go to see his king.

"Given what we know, I don't think it would be wise to bring the man back for a public execution," Arthur's father was saying. "However desirable that might be. This is a far more dangerous sorcerer than the usual breed. From the account-- he has faced off bandits, he can summon fire from his empty hands, who knows what else he is capable of? Travelling with him is out of the question. Bringing him _here_ is out of the question. You will treat him as you would a magical beast. Find him, and when you find him, kill him where he stands. Is that understood?"

Arthur ought to have already been protesting. Looking back, much later, he would sometimes wonder why he had ever listened to more than two words of this. Not only now, but for so many months before. He had said far too little of what it would have been _right_ to say. He had wanted his father's approval too much for either of their good -- instead of appeasing him, trying to keep what influence he had to wield in little ways to make little, insignificant differences, Arthur should have been trying to change his father, doing whatever he could to make this situation never happen, from the moment Arthur himself had changed.

But now, in this moment-- Yes, he had heard his orders. He understood. And the man _might_ be a threat. Despite so many learnt exceptions, there was a part of Arthur's mind that still made that familiar connection, from _powerful magic_ to _kill_. There was a moment for which he had to fight himself, and another where he felt weighted down, unable to speak.

His father seemed to take Arthur's silence as consent. And perhaps, in fact, Arthur had bowed his head automatically, signalling by habit and by force of expectation that he would submit.

"Good," his father said -- and he gave by a look a scant quantity of that approval Arthur always wanted. "Bring back his head -- we can display it. And do whatever you can to make sure that the wretch does not cross the borders. I will not have it said that Mercia or Kent takes care of our sorcerers for us."

They would cut him down and string him up, much the same as Camelot. There were few enough safe places to be a sorcerer in Albion.

"What of the Druids?" Arthur said. It was his first, vain hope: for an escape. An unlikely one. As more and more of their people had been captured every time they ventured beyond their encampments -- and, perhaps, seeing the apparent invulnerability of Camelot's king as well as its prince to any of the attempts made against them -- the Druids seemed to have abandoned the kingdom altogether, the half-hidden, once secret places where they had welcomed others of their kind falling back into the ordinary landscape as open valleys and forest clearings. But there was always the slight chance that some might have stayed or returned. Arthur's father had a minor network of spies placed across the country in case of that very eventuality. "Still no sightings, I suppose."

"None. I'm beginning to believe we really are free of them. But if you think there are any remnants this new sorcerer might find -- I think they _would_ be foolish enough to take him in. He could lead us straight to them. You have my consent, if you think it's worth a try."

"No, I don't think so," Arthur said.

His father nodded in a brief, slight way -- the formalised, kingly version of a shrug. "Very well," he said, and he seemed about to send Arthur on his way.

Arthur thought of how sickeningly easy it would be to let himself be sent. He could take his orders without question and head forth. Or-- for one fragment of a second he thought of proposing that one of the more senior knights take his place. A useful learning experience for the man. _They need to see that they can defeat magic on their own_ , Arthur could say. _And what can we lose? What can one sorcerer do?_ Arthur could stay here, in the castle, and let whatever might happen beyond its walls happen far away from him. But his pride rebelled, and his stomach tightened as he thought of what his father would say at even the suggestion that Arthur wanted to shirk his duty. He thought of Merlin, too, once again -- a whole maze of thoughts -- and Arthur's head ached, as, once again, he bowed it down.

Somehow, all this had been easier when he had cared about it less. When he had doubted his father at times, but in a way that had seemed merely theoretical. When the death of a sorcerer had-- mattered, yes, but not like a murder. Not like yet one more indictment of Arthur's father's rule and Arthur's own part in it. So he bowed his head, and yet still:

"I think this is wrong."

His father looked as though he didn't see how there could be any objection. "In what way?" The tone was closed off, incurious. A familiar sign that his father would already rather not hear whatever it was Arthur had to say.

Arthur felt that he knew two mutually contradictory things. The first was that his father would not change his mind. Certainly not now, with a sorcerer on the loose -- his father would be urgent and certain, for as long as he believed a threat to exist to his kingdom. As long as his paranoia had an object.

The second was that there must be something Arthur could say or do to change his father's mind. If he could only find it, if he got everything right -- the words, the tone, the timing -- there _must be_ a way. Some perfect line of reasoning he could find. And if Arthur couldn't find it, this possibly-impossible thing, that was his own personal failing.

"As far as we know," he said, "this person has only ever used his magic for good. Whatever power he has -- I don't believe he should die for it."

His father seemed to take him in and take the full measure of him. "Do I need to remind you what is the law of this land?"

"No." Of course not. But it felt like an admission.

"Do I need to remind you of the reason for that law?"

"The potential dangers of magic. But is this man dangerous? He only protected his village--"

"By means of sorcery," his father cut him off, speaking slow and firm as if to an errant child: "in direct contravention of our laws."

"He protected his village," Arthur insisted. "From bandits. He was practically doing us a favour." The wrong thing to say, Arthur thought, immediately he said it. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

"We can take care of bandits without any assistance," his father said, and Arthur felt a flush rise high and hot on his cheeks even before the addition of: "Or at least, I hope you still can."

"Yes, I can." And again, he was bowing his head. But this wasn't the point. "But do we execute men for protecting their own?"

"We execute men for breaking the law, and for being a threat to this kingdom, to the continued existence of its laws, to the safety of everyone who lives beneath them. Because when a man _chooses_ to practise magic, he raises himself above the law. He thinks he raises himself above everything, above life and death, and the only way to stop him causing the destruction you yourself have seen that magic wreaks is to end his life. And I had thought, Arthur -- I had hoped -- that you understood that."

Arthur made one last attempt. "We could use him. He could be of use to us. Surely, in the right hands, magic -- couldn't it even be an asset?" He ought to have been able to sound more entirely certain. He _was_ certain: except somehow he couldn't take hold of that certainty within himself whilst fighting his father's gaze and all those decades of battles his father had fought and won. And then there were those two, heavy decades Arthur had spent learning to obey this man, to put his father's judgement before everything.

"No." His father said it with a wonderful ease of firmness. Arthur realised that this was not even a question in his father's mind. "We could not." And then, as if in conciliation, reaching back out to Arthur and showing him the way to be his father's son: "I did think that, once, when I was your age. There was a time, though you may never have heard of it-- there was a time when I tried to make users of magic my allies. I was naive. You can't know this the way I do, and I hope you never will: it's never worth trusting someone who holds that kind of power. What you risk is-- incalculable."

It was the worst blow of all. This strange, harsh tenderness -- Arthur had no defence. He felt he could see the raw wound of the past, nurtured, kept open for all those years -- his father's mysterious grudge, whatever terrible injury magic had done to him -- and Arthur wished, like begging for a thousand shining, impossible things, that he could be able to heal it.

"Yes, father." He bowed his head, one final time.

"Good. You have your orders," his father said. "You will do what needs to be done."

 

When Arthur had first found out about Merlin's magic, it was an accident. It had been a cold December's day, and Arthur had headed over to Gaius' chambers with a familiar warm exasperation to hunt out his missing manservant, who had been supposed to be joining Arthur for a round of sparring on the frozen practice fields. A warm-up, as Arthur liked to put it: just a little fun before the knights came out for their turn. In fact, Merlin was steadily improving in proficiency, learning a kind of gangly grace that made it harder and harder work for Arthur to maintain anything like the illusion of effortless superiority -- but he had taken an unexamined pleasure in every sulky look and helpless scowl he provoked. Merlin had always got under his skin, right from the start, even when he had seemed nothing more than an ignorant, impudent peasant, and Arthur had never liked anything more than to _get_ right back.

Stepping in from the courtyard, he had found the door to the infirmary very slightly ajar. The bolt had come out the day before, in what he would later find out had been one of Merlin's earlier trials of a lock-picking spell. Arthur walked in without a second thought, to see Merlin knelt at the fireplace over a dying fire, a foreign language on his tongue, his hands spread over the area where, a second later, the flames burst up in a healthy blaze.

Arthur slipped back out and pulled the door closed as soundlessly as he could. The door still seemed likely to swing open again: he wedged it in place with a stone. He allowed himself to forget the missed appointment. When Merlin attended him in his room that evening, Arthur watched him closely, and then wondered, once Merlin was gone -- having carried out his duties in much the usual fashion -- what exactly it was he had expected he would see.

It took Arthur five days to decide what to do, and even longer to understand why it was he hadn't brought Merlin to his father that very first moment in the infirmary and followed the law he was sworn to uphold.

Merlin seemed anxious, a little afraid, but also relieved when Arthur confronted him with what he knew. And he seemed to grow out of his fearfulness as quickly as it had come upon him, as he and Arthur spoke.

"I wanted to tell you," Merlin had said -- open and sure. "I wanted -- not quite from the first." He grinned. "But soon after."

Arthur had said -- and asked -- and wondered -- a lot of things. But, "Make sure that you're careful," was all he said with regard to the law. He had been counting and recounting the number of times over he owed Merlin his life.

It had all seemed somehow simple, then. The decisions had all-but made themselves. Arthur knew -- of course he knew, how could he not? -- that he was committing a betrayal, and one that his father, if he ever knew, might find unforgivable. It was a betrayal of Arthur's father himself, of his most firmly held beliefs, as well as of the laws of his country, and a far worse one than Arthur's part in the rescue of the druid child. Arthur was now effectively harbouring a dangerous sorcerer within the castle, paying the man, even -- keeping him in his own service. And it had been one of Arthur's own first thoughts, upon understanding Merlin's power, how easily Merlin could and could have, at any time, killed any one of the royal household and gone undetected.

Arthur tried, a few times, to convince Merlin that he should leave -- Merlin refused with an easy carelessness, laughing and asking if he was fired again. And Arthur had reasoned to himself, if Merlin wouldn't leave the kingdom entirely, it was best to kep him nearby. In view. Arthur's heart was never really in sending Merlin away.

And then the days went by, and Merlin gradually began to use magic more and more in Arthur's presence, and more and more openly, to do a thousand tiny, amazing things. Arthur couldn't connect it with the kinds of evil he had fought and that his father had taught him to hate. His betrayal became more and more theoretical to him, less and less a matter of conflict. He was concerned, and did what he could, to protect Merlin's secret; but he ceased to be concerned that he was betraying the duty laid out for him by doing so.

They had defeated monsters together. They had been on hunting trips, warmed their fingers by magical fires, and Arthur had watched as Merlin spun pictures from the flames, swallowing back his awe. They had carried on as master and manservant, Merlin fetching and carrying -- choosing, Arthur had realised, allowing himself to be ordered -- and Arthur still teaching Merlin how to fight, still mocking him, as much or more than ever. He barely give a thought to the fact that he might on some technicality be seen as training an enemy of the kingdom.

They had freed magical prisoners from the dungeons, too -- but Arthur had done that before. He learnt to see it as a small correction, rather than an outright rebellion against his father's rule. They diverted attention from those suspected of sorcery. Arthur destroyed documents and quietly dropped certain informants. He found ways to protect sorcerers other than Merlin.

Arthur had felt that he was keeping things in a kind of balance. Outwardly, he upheld every one of his father's laws and kept his place at his father's right hand. At times he thus became involved in what he now felt he knew to be wrong. He became a kind of hypocrite. He knew it. But he could stomach it. By his hypocrisy he kept that place where every one of the castle keys was within his grasp and every one of its inhabitants beside his father himself was Arthur's to command -- and from that place Arthur reckoned that he could smooth out many of the flaws in his father's reign and do the kind of good that a righteous and disinherited exile might have struggled to achieve in decades of open defiance. In weak, foolish moments he felt wistful for the happiness of ignorance, but he felt a kind of pride in his adaptation to a more complex, more difficult sense of his duty towards his kingdom. He believed that he could keep things in balance.

And then, incredibly, one day: something else. One evening: Merlin with Arthur, as often, in Arthur's chamber. Arthur leaning back against a wall and watching Merlin. Merlin at the table, leaning forwards into his work. Merlin practising spells, conjuring a piece of parchment through a thousand different shapes, his narrow face compellingly intent.

Merlin had looked up, caught Arthur watching, lowered his head a moment and then looked back up into Arthur's face.

"Um," Merlin said. "You know, I was thinking. That is, I'd sort of started to think--"

Arthur pushed his hopes away one second after he half-anticipated what was to come. "Well?" he said, when Merlin did not immediately continue.

"Well," Merlin said -- and then something in his expression put the whole thing beyond doubt. "Um. Well. How do you feel about _men_?"

And Arthur had laughed as his uncertainty left him, startled in his relief, long and loud, _happy_ , long into the night.

 

Arthur left his father in the throne room and set about his business.

He had been told that the news of the sorcerer's existence had been brought by a young woman -- barely more than a girl. Bandits had attacked the village of Oreald at the very first soft touch of light in the sky. They had been driven off by the sorcerer within moments, he himself had then fled, and the girl had been sent on the village's only fast horse, riding full-pelt through the half-dark of dawn, taking the whole journey in a little under an hour. Hence such swift news of the events.

Camelot's stables would replace the horse, of course. And some favours would be done to the village -- some good meat sent down after the next hunt, perhaps some leniency at the next collection of taxes. Arthur's father would reward such energetic dedication to his law.

Arthur wondered a little at the choice to send a girl. It would usually have been someone more respected in the community and better able to protect themselves on the road. Though at least the many people about on their way to their morning's work would have given her a kind of protection. And Arthur supposed he could see how, with hard work to be done in the fields, she might have been most easily spared. And anyone really feeble would have made a poor rider, whatever their status.

The poor thing must be exhausted, Arthur thought. Nevertheless, there would be no excuse for a delay. He gave orders that she be sent to the chamber adjoining his own.

It was this room that he generally used for small meetings and gatherings, and for purposes such as this -- as a sort of would-be antechamber. There was no bed, but there was a largish, plain table, a thick bearskin rug before the fireplace and a number of chairs, as well as Arthur's personal collection of books and some trophies and more ornamental items of weaponry hanging on the walls. It could help, sometimes, for people to be reminded of what he was good at.

Upon reaching this room, Arthur found it empty. There was no sign of Merlin, either here or in Arthur's bedchamber. Arthur wondered, as he waited, how much of what was afoot might already be known about the castle. News of sorcery spread particularly fast in Camelot, her people making anxiously sure to spread even the most infinitesimal rumours on the subject: no one wanted to be accused of keeping a sorcerer's secrets.

Arthur tried to decide how much Merlin might already have learnt. Merlin was popular enough amongst the other servants that he would hardly be left out of their gossip -- he had a smile for everyone, he seemed to genuinely like people, immensely, from the moment of meeting; and in return they almost all of them seemed to like him just as much. Arthur could picture him now, at the centre of a cluster of chattering kitchen maids and stable boys, questioning, talking, learning the whole thing. Someone would certainly have eavesdropped upon Arthur's interview with his father. Merlin might be hearing of it now. It would all come out soon enough, at any rate.

Arthur thought of how obviously troubled Merlin would look as he listened. Indiscreet. Being Merlin, though, he would probably shake himself, smile, and get away with it. Merlin seemed to survive by positively emanating guileless straightforwardness, to an extent that had always made any serious suspicion against him seem absurd. Arthur himself had been taken in too well and for too long not to know it. There had been one quiet moment, half a year ago now -- watching Merlin reshape bent, battered armour to something better than new with a second's concentration, a glance and a word -- when Arthur had realised: it worked so well because Merlin was taken in himself. Merlin knew he was powerful; but he had no real understanding of quite how incredibly _different_ he was compared to everyone else. And it was not exactly the sort of subject Arthur knew how to raise.

The girl was soon ushered in by a maid, deposited in front of Arthur, and the door closed. The girl's eyes darted, catlike, to the closing door: she bowed late but deep, and when she rose she looked anywhere but at Arthur. He asked her name first, though he knew it already, and then he pushed her -- probably clumsily -- through a more detailed account of what had happened than he had got from his father.

The fire the sorcerer had cast sounded very much like a lesser version of the kind Merlin often summoned. It could probably even be obstructed at least temporarily with a good, strong shield. Arthur thought that had they been better trained, better organised, the bandits might have stood a good chance of prevailing, even with armed villagers about them to come to the sorcerer's aid. But of course, the bandits would had panicked at the sight of magic. Most people's only experience of such things was in the form of those large beasts that occasionally seemed to swoop into the kingdom from who knew where, too monstrous for ordinary mortals to do anything but flee. It was unlikely that many of Camelot's subjects had seen magic at the command of a human being for as long as twenty years, or more.

The girl spoke with an air of determined, desperate pride -- as if she was trying to be much older and higher-born than she was. She was a scrawny, tiny sort of creature, in fact looking younger than her professed age (seventeen), with a head of warmthless blonde hair gathered into a messy bun. She wore men's breeches, obviously borrowed for her ride, loose and ill-fitting, and a dusty tunic that might originally have been red. Or perhaps, just as easily, a ruddy brown.

"Did you know the man well?" Arthur asked her, and she flinched. "I'm not accusing you of anything," he sought to clarify. "I only need to know as much as I can about him to help us with our search, so that he can be found and the law enacted."

"Yes," she said. "I understand."

"It is the law," Arthur said, although she hadn't seemed doubtful.

"Yes," the girl repeated.

"Yes, well. And I suppose what remains is-- Did you know the man? Anything you can tell me about him, where he might go, who his friends are, his relations, it all might be helpful." He should probably have smiled encouragingly at her, but he didn't.

"I, um, I didn't know him, but-- Not well. A little. Um." She paused, staring straight ahead at Arthur's shoulder, and then recommenced speaking more quickly. "He's twenty one, um, he was a farmer, his parents are dead and he always seemed normal. But no one will help him, though. No one ever suspected, no one knew."

"No, of course not, it's all right. Your village won't suffer."

The girl lowered her head. "Thank you, sire."

"I know my father must be pleased by the loyalty you have shown today." Or at least, the strong understanding of what was needed to survive. Sometimes it was indistinguishable from loyalty.

The girl bowed her head again, and recited, rote: "We love and obey our king."

 

Arthur sent her off with another maid, whom he gave orders to find the girl some better clothing, but still suitable for riding, and to let her rest a while if there was time before he should send for her again. He would have to bring her along: there couldn't be a question. She was the only person currently available within the castle who would be able to conclusively identify the sorcerer by sight. A description -- dark hair, dark eyes, tall height -- would hardly be enough.

Stood at his table, bent over it with his palms pressed to the surface, Arthur closed his eyes and tried to rearrange his thoughts. His father would expect him to set off very soon -- not to dally or drag -- but Arthur wanted to take care about whom he brought to face a sorcerer, and for all the different possibilities he could imagine might be to come.

Ten was a good number. Over months and years of hunting down beasts and bandits, Arthur had learnt that about ten or eleven men seemed to be about the maximum that would willingly, easily and unthinkingly put their lives on the line for one another. Any more, and somehow the nature of the group changed. There might be a few strong friendships, but overall, the ties between the men would be suddenly much looser, more impersonal. A man would put himself at risk for his companion amidst a small group, but not for the twenty-sixth or even sixteenth man down the line. But ten would hold and fight together well. Besides, whilst, theoretically, his father had left Arthur free to manage the matter to his own judgement -- whilst, theoretically, Arthur could take as large a force as he wanted -- this did not mean that his father would be happy to see him take many of Camelot's defenders from the castle. Or to see that his son felt the need for any massive assistance to take on a village sorcerer, however dangerous. Arthur was supposed to be better than that.

All of his choices would be watched, scrutinised, and brought up for criticism if anything went wrong. In its way, this was a test. Much as, in its way, Arthur supposed just about everything in his life was a test. Something he had to get through. An opportunity to prove himself -- or to prove himself unworthy, if he turned out to be incapable. But then, perhaps that was right. Arthur could not seriously resent a way of life that had made him what he was and given him all the strengths he had.

He had to count the girl as a part of the group to be -- as she would be, thought she would not fight. That made one. Then himself. Then, travelling with a woman, it would be best to have another woman along. Both for propriety and to keep a better eye on the girl and, if necessary, keep her soothed and well-disposed to their mission. There was no way this would be easy for the girl. She would be amongst those sent to hunt down a man she had known, and whatever she said, coming from the same village and not being too distant in age, there was no way the two could not have been at least somewhat well-known to each other. Not that Arthur could blame the girl for lying somewhat, given the circumstances. And it mattered very little.

So. A woman. And a bow-woman, Arthur thought. There were few women really skilled with the sword in the castle besides Morgana herself, and Morgana was out of the question. She was both weakened by dreams and ever more busied with a quiet, grim kind of politicking Arthur couldn't see through and to which he thought his father must be wilfully blind. And even if she hadn't been, Morgana was _reckless_. Maybe even more so than Merlin. And she would never doubt, for a moment, that the sorcerer must be rescued, whatever the cost. She had a kind of fervid certainty about these things that Arthur found both enviable and immensely troubling. He was a little glad that, from what he heard, she was too unwell today to be likely to know what was afoot until after he had left.

There were, however, a number of well-born ladies who were skilled with the bow. They practised in an area of the castle grounds that had become their own, and had received the mostly tacit approval of Arthur's father, who had a practical liking to see anyone he considered allied to him gain some battle-skill. Some of the women treated their archery as a hobby, an entertainment, but others were highly dedicated, and practised for long hours. Arthur had at first assumed that this came mostly from a desire to escape that mixture of intrigue and needlework that seemed to make up so much of the feminine world within doors. It was only more recently, catching sight of them, hearing their twanging bow-strings as he had trudged, exhausted and happy, from another gruelling afternoon of sparring, that the obvious thought struck Arthur: that they, like he, must also practise for the love of it -- for the enjoyment of their own skill.

There was one, the lady Laudine, daughter of a knight, whom Arthur remembered as well-disciplined, somewhat solemn, and -- importantly -- a good shot. And a good archer might even be the best thing against a sorcerer. Arthur thought sombrely of how a single, swift arrow-shot might see to a sorcerer before he could even begin to cast a spell, and before whoever fired the shot was close enough, perhaps, for the man's fire spells to be much use.

Arthur felt disgustingly unsure of his own intentions. Of course it would be best if the man could be saved -- presuming that he really was no danger. Arthur assumed the man wasn't dangerous. He had no evidence, no reason to think otherwise. He couldn't think otherwise.

But in any case, Arthur had to act as his father would expect. He would take out a good force. Do otherwise, and his father would send out a second. Then, with experienced men all around him, he must continue to do all the right things: everything to ensure the sorcerer's death. And then, when they found the sorcerer -- what then? Unless by some miracle he managed to escape -- could Arthur _make_ an escape for him? He didn't think so. He thought that all he could do was see what came, do the best he could, and steel himself for the worst.

Few of the knights spent much time on archery -- it was left to lesser men -- but Arthur came up with the names of two who were decent enough with a crossbow, Hector and Gryflet. Then he would bring three more knights: he thought Tor, Cador and Aglovale, all good, reliable men. That made eight people in total. Then they would want a couple of squires to pick up and carry, make encampments, see to the horses, that sort of thing; but they would also have to be reliable men, and decent enough in a fight. Arthur reckoned that of the knights he had decided upon, Tor and Gryflet's squires would be the best. And that would make ten.

He went through it all, went through it all again, and couldn't think of any reason not to go ahead. He went down and gave orders: all those he had settled upon must be summoned and made ready, and general preparations must be made for what might be several days' searching. And then he headed to the armoury to equip himself, and there he found -- or was found by -- Merlin.

 

Arthur watched the armoury door close and lock behind him as if of its own will, so that he and Merlin were alone and in private, the room shady, muted, despite glints of reflected light upon its weaponry.

"I don't have long," Arthur said -- snapped -- irritably.

"It's actually true, isn't it?" said Merlin. "It's true, it's all over your face. There's someone like me."

"Yes. There is."

"And you're under orders to kill him."

"Yes. I am."

There was a weighted silence, during which Arthur wished he had any idea what Merlin was thinking. And then:

"I'm coming with you." Which was what Arthur had been afraid of.

"You're _not_." And it wasn't just all the risks -- that over several days journeying, with little privacy, Merlin would get himself found out. Or that he would when they found the man. Or that he would commit some treachery, and drag Arthur along with him. There was also -- Arthur acknowledged it to himself -- there was also the thought that if Arthur was going to kill a sorcerer, he would much rather Merlin did not see.

"I need to be there," Merlin said. "You have to let me." His voice was urgent. "Besides, what if he does turn out to be dangerous? What then?"

"Then I'll fight him." This, at least, was simple.

"No, I will."

"No you won't." Arthur remembered, vividly, the one time he had seen Merlin fight magic with magic -- gold blazing in his eyes and that strange language loud and alien in his voice. And he recalled what Merlin had told him of other fights. He thought of whirlwinds and lightning. There would be no possibility, no chance of disguise. It would mean either Merlin's execution or his exile.

Merlin was shaking his head vigorously. "Can you be certain we'll have a choice? If he _is_ powerful, and if he _does_ attack you--"

"We'll manage," Arthur said.

"It's better if I'm there. Besides-- _besides_. I think, probably, he's good. He protected his village. Just like me."

Arthur opened his mouth to agree, to admit to it, but Merlin had already assumed his agreement.

"We can save him. We'll find somewhere for him -- there must be a way."

" _Merlin_ ," Arthur said, trying to put some force, some _pull_ , some kind of gravity into the word, because in spite of the silence, he felt he was fighting for Merlin's attention. "There may not be."

"There will be a way."

"And I order you not to come."

"It's our best chance," Merlin said. There was an energy in his voice that made it all seem compellingly certain. "And I'll only follow you anyway." And then, discordant, clumsy, but slipping incomprehensibly into _right_ , he came forwards, smoothed his fingers over the backs of Arthur's hands where they hung at his sides, touched his waist, his arm, and kissed him with slow intensity -- as if to set everything into place.

 

Arthur made his way to the stables with Merlin by his side, and heard the background hum of human activity in the castle grow quiet. And then, echoing from the courtyard against the stone, he heard his father's voice. A speech, to settle the rumours and announce the King's response. The distance and the way it had carried had a distorting effect, so that it was hard to understand more than the essential drift, but Arthur picked out several repetitions of the words _evil_ , _sorcery_ , _punishable_ and _my son_.

Most of the party were already assembled in the stables, the squires just readying the last of the horses. Edith was off in one corner, and Laudine too, already doing her job, murmuring to her, her voice taking a well-chosen, feminine and soothing tone. No one remarked on Merlin's presence. In fact, there was already an eleventh horse out and ready for him, the bay Merlin usually rode -- he accompanied Arthur almost everywhere, and at some point, Arthur realised, it must simply have become expected.

The last two of the knights arrived to join them, and Arthur mounted and watched Merlin do the same, Arthur's father's voice still hearable but faded, muffled in the hay. Arthur stopped, and took one moment to take Merlin in: the slight slouch of his shoulders and curve of his back, the clear paleness of his skin, the sharp lines of his cheekbones and the dark, unfixable mess of his hair. It had become one of those strange, unfightable things: to be drawn to look again and again in that one, familiar direction.

They rode out. The people looked up to them as they passed, watching, knowing what they were about. Arthur brought his horse to the front, and kept his eyes fixed ahead. They went through the outer gates and into the countryside, and off to the south, towards Oreald, whence they would begin their search.

Behind Arthur, some conversation began to grow up, starting in a few words exchanged between the knights and spreading from there, jokes and easy, idle chat tossed from rider to rider, the two women beginning to be drawn to join in. Individuals already beginning to tie themselves together as a unit. Arthur let his horse slow so that he was near the centre of the group, riding in much looser formation now that they were out in the open. He offered another apology to Edith for making her ride again so soon -- the first had been in the stables -- and tried to say a few polite, friendly things to make her feel more comfortable in the situation.

"He's a real prat, you know," Merlin interrupted, riding up at Edith's other side. "Don't be fooled by the charming, awkward act."

Arthur had to fight a smile, amused despite everything. "Shut up, Merlin, and show some proper respect."

Merlin only rolled his eyes. He whispered something to Edith, and somehow managed to make her beam far brighter and more openly than the slight smiles Arthur had managed to elicit.

"What did you say to her?" Arthur asked, when a while later they found themselves off to one side of the others.

"That you were charming? That was a mistake."

"By which of course you mean eminently true."

Merlin pulled a face. "Yeah, right. And you're also the god of sex."

Arthur looked about sharply, to check again that there was still no one all that near by them. "So you've told me, several times," he pointed out, speaking low. "Idiot."

A sort of odd friendship between them had long ago become the norm from others' perspectives, long before Arthur had even known what Merlin was, and that appearance of friendship in itself was safe enough. In the eyes of the court, Merlin was a likeable youth and if Arthur was entertained by him and tended to keep him to hand, that was natural enough. Beyond that-- he and Merlin hadn't talked about it, and they hadn't exactly not talked about it, but there had been a few snatches of half-conversation in which it had been roughly agreed that they would keep their -- alterations -- concealed. Arthur did not want to draw any extra attention to Merlin that might risk the discovery of Merlin's magic. And Merlin was instantly uncomfortable at the thought of any possible change in his status that might follow the revelation that he was bedding the Prince. And then, underneath it all, barely evident in a word or two, here and there, was the thought that if Merlin were found out as a sorcerer, any public knowledge of their relationship would make things far, far worse for Arthur than they would be even with only their friendship known. Without other reasons for concealment, this one might not have been enough, but as things were, it was still there, still an advantage to what they had chosen.

Secrecy had become an important protection, for both of them. There were ways in which it was disconcerting, frustrating -- it was not the shape Arthur felt his life ought to have. It was not what he was used to. And yet he was growing used to it. He depended upon it. To have all their secrets blown apart seemed worse than unthinkable. Only, Merlin never behaved as if he really felt the immense risk of it all in quite the same way. Merlin, who had been caught so easily, never seemed to believe that it could happen again.

"What did you whisper to her?" Arthur asked Merlin, trying to steer the conversation in a more innocuous direction. "And why do I get the feeling it was something about me?"

"Ah," said Merlin, and looked shifty. "Well."

" _Merlin_."

"I mayhavesaid that you suck your thumb. At night. When you're asleep."

"I see," said Arthur.

"In my defence, it might be true. You couldn't know, for definite, if you were asleep. I could have witnessed it while I was manservanting."

"Except you've just effectively given away that I don't, and you haven't."

"Mm. But I could _make_ it true." Merlin grinned, and there was just a suggestion of glitter about his irises, just for a moment. Arthur tamped down his nerves and though he looked about them again, he forced himself to do it slowly and naturally, as if nothing had happened. And they were safe. Thankfully.

"You really are an idiot," he muttered to Merlin, but Merlin looked entirely unapologetic.

 

At Oreald, they left Edith to rest for a while, with Laudine watching over her. Arthur had offered to find a replacement and let Edith go, but she had been insistent, as had her father:

"My daughter knows her duty. She won't shirk it." He spoke firmly, and then looked about him as if to check that he had been heard by the few other peasants out in the square at that time of day. It put into Arthur's head the thought that some impenetrable village politics might have been involved in the choice of Edith for messenger. Her father had turned out to be one of the wealthiest inhabitants, to the extent that any of them had any wealth -- taking in the tiny, fragile-looking housing, the muddy tracks for paths and the worn down clothes and faces of the people, Arthur reflected that the term was hardly appropriate -- and it had been he who came out to greet Arthur and his party when they arrived, as a kind of unofficial village leader. Arthur could imagine how easily he might be replaced, and how any sign of status would be snatched at.

Arthur went through what had happened over again, as with Edith. Her father had nothing really new to add to the account, except that, since they were actually in the village, he could show where the confrontation had taken place and point in the direction the man had fled. Arthur nodded to his troop and they set off, splitting up, to begin their tracking work immediately, leaving only the women, in Edith's father's house, and Merlin and Arthur.

"I have to apologise, sire," Edith's father -- his name was Werian -- said, unexpectedly.

"What for?" Arthur said. "You can hardly--" His heart sank, as he guessed Werian's meaning. He thought of what his father's reputation must be, out in the villages, after all his purges: of how these small communities must have been reshaped. "You mustn't think you will be held to blame because a sorcerer lived here," he said.

"We should have suspected something. We know the law, and we have always been watchful, but--" Werian shook his head. "We can only be more watchful in future."

Arthur could not immediately think of a reply. He was incapable of saying what he believed -- he couldn't tell a man that he shouldn't care for Arthur's father's law and authority -- but he couldn't bring himself to encourage this kind of paranoia. A glance at Merlin showed that he was frowning deeply, which didn't help.

"And then," Werian went on, filling the silence, looking more troubled still, "when we saw what M-- what he was, that he was a sorcerer, we let him get away. We should have stopped him."

"No one blames you," Arthur repeated himself, awkwardly. Merlin had now clenched his fists and was staring straight ahead.

"We don't-- We all want to see the sorcerer killed," said Werian. "Please believe me, sire. I want to see nothing more."

"But he lived here!" Merlin cut in -- and Arthur could tell that it was simply blurted out before Merlin could stop himself. "He lived here, amongst you, you probably _liked_ him, and now you want--" Arthur quickly cut him off:

"Merlin!"

Werian looked stunned, fearful and uncertain; but also somewhat affronted, snobbish as any noble, that Arthur's manservant had spoken to him thus. _Status_ , Arthur thought again. People watched each other in these villages as closely as in the great castle, and in an environment where there was someone to see everything. It was something of a miracle that a sorcerer in their midst had gone undetected so long. He had been in danger every moment.

Merlin seemed to recollect himself a little, but he still went on: "Well, but did he ever do anything wrong?" And Arthur felt envious of the way Merlin could come out and say it, even as he hated his recklessness and the murky terror it made loom up in Arthur's heart.

Werian looked between them, and said, "He was a sorcerer. Just that is the worst wrong he could do us," in the tones of one determined to give the right answer. He had probably decided Merlin's outburst was staged, a test. Merlin's usual good luck.

"Of course," said Arthur. "And we are grateful for your loyalty and assistance. You will not go unrewarded."

Werian bowed and thanked him; Arthur forced an acknowledging nod in return and drew Merlin away quickly, before Merlin could have a chance to say anything further.

 

Arthur's party regrouped and departed Oreald not long after, setting off in the direction their quarry seemed to have taken.

Once, in the days after he first found out about Merlin, Arthur had sat down with every map he owned, spreading them across his table, his bed, his floor. He had sketched out copies, had charted routes and circled landmarks, trying to discover where and how a known sorcerer might flee.

Every human being the man passed would be an enemy. Camelot was a busy place, the rich lands alive with labourers, and with enough riders about that the spread of news would quickly outpace a single traveller on foot. A fugitive would stand out by a thousand signs -- and everyone would be on the lookout for a share in the glory of having helped kill a sorcerer. And no one would want to risk being charged with having helped him go free. Even if no one dared attack the man, everyone would be willing and ready to inform on him.

To try to stay and hide would be as impossible as staying within the castle itself. Few parts of the kingdom were truly desolate, and it was in the wild places of Albion, the forest depths, the deep caves and high mountains, where the most monstrous magical beasts seemed to make their nests. Arthur's father's campaigns had not freed Camelot of such creatures. No matter how many were slain, there were always more. Arthur had sometimes wondered if they weren't born of the land itself. And whatever their genesis, he doubted anyone would seek refuge in these creatures' homes.

The man could head for one of the borders: whence he would have to pass through another hostile kingdom, and another, before he could find anywhere safe for his kind. Merlin -- if it ever came to it -- might manage to get through, to the far north. It was a long journey, but he could disguise himself, fend off pursuers, protect himself pretty well.

Arthur doubted this man was that powerful. He had thrown a little fire and scared off some bandits -- Merlin could have had them on their knees in as little time, or worse. Though if the man was more powerful than that, if he had been purposefully showing mercy, if he _could_ make some escape for himself, well enough. Well enough. Provided he was benign; and provided he didn't now turn on them, now that Camelot was his enemy. In the sorcerer's position, Arthur thought that he himself would not have been benignly disposed.

If the man chose against the borders, and against some hiding place where he could wait for his discovery and death, he might head for the docks. If he could find a ship that would take him, he could leave Albion altogether. Sailors spent so much time away from the land that they might feel more free of its laws: they might be willing to aid a fugitive, for enough of a price. The man would have to steal the money, which could end in detection or even capture simply for the theft. And he would have to make his way through and spend time in a busy town. Particularly, unless he was very lucky, he would have to wait there and perhaps stay the night until his ship, if he even found one, was ready to sail.

The risk was immense. There were guards in all the ports who could be summoned swiftly, the moment the man made himself suspicious; and Arthur knew that his father had sent out messengers everywhere, in order that his men should be on the lookout. Anyone with a hint of something odd about him might be detained, and once detained, it was only a matter of time before someone was found to identify him.

The docks might be the man's best chance, but it was barely a chance. It wasn't really a chance at all, Arthur thought. Only a better grounds for false hope than any of the other options.

So perhaps, then, the best thing would be for Arthur's own party to find the man. To give Merlin a chance at whatever ineffable _something_ , whatever miracle he hoped he could wreak; or so that Arthur himself could make the kill. It was a ghastly thought. But if the man had to die, then that would be best. Arthur would maintain his father's approval, his standing, his influence; a deflection for any suspicion against himself. In its own bleak way it would be excellently practical.

The trail was growing uncertain. Arthur ordered that the party split up again into twos and threes to search down any witnesses to the man's passing by, or for any other signs that he was still headed the right way. Merlin drew up to him as they two took their path.

"You're quiet," Merlin said.

Arthur scanned about him, trying to decide how likely they were to find anything in this direction. What would happen if they found the man himself? He could be here on this path, perhaps only half a mile ahead -- it was unlikely, but it was possible. Or what if they found a man who might or might not be their man, whom Arthur would have to take prisoner and bring back for Edith to identify and for the rest to watch him kill. Would Arthur do it? What would Merlin do? What might Merlin _not_ do?

"Extremely quiet," Merlin added, and Arthur realised he hadn't replied.

"I don't like having to do this," he said. An explanation on the way to becoming a bad excuse.

"No," said Merlin. "But it won't-- You and me, we'll find a way to stop this. We'll think of something." He spoke with grim determination.

 

"The wretch's stolen a horse," Cador said, when they reunited at the settled meeting point. "Used magic, startled the beast so it threw the rider, rode off still heading south. He'll be faster, of course, but now we _know_ it's him, and there are a lot fewer horsemen than men on foot, there are tracks to follow and more people'll notice him."

Arthur nodded through it, clapped Cador on the shoulder and thanked him for his good work.

"I want to catch the bastard as much as you do," Cador assured him, to sounds of general agreement. "Maybe he fought bandits today, but we've all seen enough men killed by magic. I know what's right."

Arthur said, "Good man!" and hoped Merlin wasn't frowning too obviously; and only belatedly thought to look to Edith, to check how she was reacting. But her head was down so he couldn't see her face. Then he saw Laudine say something to her, and Edith look up and nod, calm enough.

They kept on in their pursuit until late in the evening, when it was almost entirely black, at which point they made camp and settled down to eat a few of their provisions. They could have carried on -- Arthur thought they were now very close on the man's tail, and if he stopped for the night they would have a chance of catching him as he slept. But there was an equal chance of their missing him in the darkness and losing their trail. The man might get a lead on them if he didn't stop to sleep, but he would have to leave his horse -- or ride it to death -- and would walk more and more slowly as he tired. Moreover, he would still have to stop to rest at some point. There would be ample opportunity to catch up with him.

Arthur's thoughts were cut through by a confidential chuckle from one of the knights: Hector, a recent arrival at Camelot, three or four years older than Arthur himself. Arthur had purposefully sat by the man he knew least, and then got lost in his own thoughts, like a fool, and forgotten to speak to him. But Hector seemed to be doing Arthur's work for him.

"I think your manservant's making a bit of a conquest," Hector said. He leaned in, warming his face and hands by the fire. Arthur offered him his wine flask, and Hector took a long swig. "Thanks. Well, she's pretty enough," he said. "For a peasant."

Arthur looked round to where Merlin was, indeed, engaged in what looked like quite intimate conversation with Edith -- the two crouched down beneath a tree a little way off, him bent towards her. Arthur fought the urge to go over there immediately and find out what Merlin was about. He put some good humour into his voice to say:

"Ah, but I think her father looks down on poor Merlin."

"So it's star-crossed. Poor Merlin indeed!" Hector laughed. "But are you sure? Manservant to the prince is not to be sniffed at."

"I think he's the proudly independent type."

"Ah, I know." Hector mimicked the accent of the Camelot peasantry, rather crudely: " _I'm me own man, I own me own land, and I don't take orders from no one._ But he'll ruin the girl's chances! And how long are you planning on keeping Merlin as your servant? He's a personable sort, but he's not really the court type, you know. No intrigue, no secrets to him."

Arthur shook his head and smiled. "Perhaps not!"

"Put him through a year's more service, then give him a bit of land to farm and let him make good. Let poor Merlin be _his_ own man and take orders from no one."

Arthur tried to imagine Merlin in combination with agriculture and failed. "You might be right," he said nevertheless.

Hector nodded enthusiastically. "Look after your servants, and they'll never kill you in your sleep. That's what my father always says."

They both laughed and drank more wine and talked idly for a little longer. Then Arthur did go over to Merlin: "Before he forgets his duty for a pretty face."

Hector raised the wine flask in a kind of salute, and then moved round to the other side of the fire, to the other knights. Arthur checked where everyone was: knights by the fire, squires seeing about the tents -- which Merlin ought really to have been helping with -- and Laudine by the squires, probably making sure that the correct arrangements would be made for herself, though occasionally glancing in Merlin and Edith's direction.

"So you saw other stuff, maybe, you just-- didn't know," Merlin was saying, as Arthur drew near.

Edith looked confused, and whispered something Arthur couldn't hear.

"Yeah," Merlin said, and looked into her face. "Um. And, what did it feel like? I mean, I've seen magic. Working for the Prince. Um, he fights it," Merlin added, and Arthur winced: part for the truth of it, and part for Merlin's utter lack of finesse. "It had a sort of _feeling_. Like a tingle and a smell of grass."

"I've never felt that," said Edith, very firmly.

Merlin rubbed a hand through his hair. "But--"

"Merlin!" Arthur said, and Merlin and Edith jumped apart, startled -- exactly as if they really had been a pair of lovers caught whispering endearments. Edith scampered off to Laudine, looking somewhat relieved about it, and Arthur bore down upon Merlin, who stood up to face him, looking undisguisedly guilty.

"I hope you're ready to settle down and learn crop rotation," said Arthur.

"What? Wait-- what? You're not firing me again, are you? Because I really don't want to have to sneak around after you and hide behind trees."

"I think technically you're still fired from last time, but no. Just wondering how much longer you're going to be fit for the position. Hector over there's been planning your wedding." Arthur jerked his head and smiled. "Actually, I think he's a bit over-invested. If you do go ahead with it, he may want to pick the date and write the vows."

Merlin stared, projecting intense confusion. Eventually, he said, "We can't get married, so I'm sure you're not proposing to me."

Arthur admitted that he was not. He said, "It was noticed that you looked very close with the girl, Edith."

"What?" said Merlin, again. And then: "Oh. _Oh_. Well I don't think she'd have me," he said.

"I rather hope _you_ wouldn't have _her_."

Merlin grinned, shrugged, and gave an equivocal sort of _hmmm_. Then he glanced over to the two women and his expression clouded.

"You don't think I've given rise to any, um-- You don't think she actually--"

"No." Arthur remembered the look of relief on Edith's face. "I don't think she does."

Merlin leant his side against the tree trunk, staring up into the canopy of its leaves. " _Good_." He let out a breath. "I was just trying to find out more about him. About Morcant." The sorcerer. "He's a good person. He was generous, he always helped people. Actually, I think he might have been using a little magic to help do repairs and things. He was sort of the town handyman as well as a farmer, and Edith said he could fix things no one else could. Though then she took it back a bit. She's very scared. Though, no, that's-- I think most of the time, she's okay. But then, suddenly, she's terrified. Like it all comes back to her." Merlin gestured vaguely. "You can't fight what's real."

"How close were they?" Arthur decided to ask.

"She said they weren't. I don't know."

Arthur nodded, and sighed. "Don't do this again." He didn't like having to ask like this. "Please."

"I was discreet," said Merlin.

"Your idea of discreet is not--"

Merlin cut him off, speaking quietly, a little desperate, a little forceful: "I don't want to see you kill this man." His face tightened, looking somehow narrower, strange. "Let me do what I can."

Arthur's mind blurred with too many thoughts.

"I'll be discreet," Merlin said. "I won't get found out. I only wish-- I want-- I wish it weren't like this. I wish you were king."

"I can't hope for the death of my father," Arthur said blankly.

"No, I know, I know you don't-- I know that's not the right thing. But you know what I mean," Merlin said.

Arthur thought he knew it all too well.

Merlin stepped backwards, into the darkness, further from the firelight, clearly expecting Arthur to follow him, to be alone and out of sight for a few snatched minutes. But Arthur couldn't. Not now.

"Indiscreet," he said, and stalked off to see about his bed.

 

The next day, they almost lost the trail. As they got further from Oreald, there were fewer and fewer people likely to recognise the man, and beyond a certain point, no one seemed to have seen a rider matching the description. For a while, Arthur thought they _had_ lost him. He had the party split up and search wider, for lack of better options.

It was Arthur himself who came upon the horse. Its body was sprawled down upon the uneven grass, and from its foamy muzzle it still uttered the occasional weak snort or whimper. He put the beast out of its misery and sent Merlin off to regather the troop.

They agreed between them that the horse had probably been ridden fast and recklessly, had caught its foot it a certain hole and fallen badly. There was little to identify it specifically, but it seemed like the merchant's horse the sorcerer had stolen. The likelihood was there, and was part-confirmed when they searched southwards and found reports of a stranger hastening his way on foot in that direction, tall and dark haired, uncommunicative and looking beaten-up.

"So! I think it's fair to say we have our trail again!" said Cador, and Arthur replied that it certainly seemed so.

"I almost thought he was safe. You're far too good at this," Merlin murmured to Arthur, soon after. Something must have shown on Arthur's face, because Merlin added, "Yeah, I know, I know-- appearances. And I guess if I--" He gave a little flourish with one hand. "--it might be a bit obvious. I've never learnt, uh, disorienting spells. Subtle stuff. Just flinging stuff and fire and whirlwinds and lightning. You know."

"Yeah, I know."

"Someone would notice."

"Yeah, they would," Arthur said. He might have said now that he would rather they find the man -- but he hesitated.

"Pity you had to bring such good knights," Merlin said, sounding awkward.

"My father would have sent a second troop if I'd chosen inferior men. And he would have known it. He still keeps track of these things." He'd heard all of Arthur's own reports.

"Yeah, I know, I mean-- Yeah," said Merlin. "You haven't had a choice."

Arthur hoped he was imagining the faint note of doubt in Merlin's voice. "If I can do something for him," Arthur said, and he spoke as quietly as he could and still be heard, "I will." He calmed the hammering that had started up in his chest.

"I know," said Merlin. "And you know that I'll do whatever I can do, anything I can do. Because what's power _for_ , if not for this?"

"I don't know. But-- Merlin. What are you planning?"

But Merlin shook his head and gave a quick, wary nod to where a few of the knights were coming near. He flashed Arthur a smile, then let his horse slow and fell back to join the squires as Tor called out to Arthur:

"We'll catch this bastard yet!"

"You're good men. I'm fortunate," Arthur said.

"I'm not sure how the Lady Laudine will take that," said Gryflet, riding up at Tor's left side as Hector joined them at Arthur's right. "Either she's not a woman or she's no good!"

"I think the Lady Laudine is above all praise," shouted Hector, far louder than was necessary; and Arthur saw Laudine look over to them from where she rode with Edith, near the head of the group with Cador and Aglovale -- the two best swordsmen of the party. The girl was looking quite grim, but Laudine smiled very slightly, and then turned her face away.

"But what I want to know is what you're so thick with young Merlin about," Hector carried on, apparently forgetting that there wasn't much difference in age between Merlin and Arthur himself. "He's a good fellow, but I don't know that he can have much to contribute on the sorcerer hunting front."

"Oh," laughed Tor, "Merlin's been on more monster hunts than the rest of us put together. And he's old Gaius' apprentice -- all those books, you know -- so he's a bit of a resident expert."

"A secret intellectual!" said Hector, looking a little stunned by the information.

"Well. I think 'intellectual' is pretty strong," said Arthur, smirking, drawn into the lightness of the moment and unable to resist, even if Merlin probably couldn't hear him. "But there is _some_ intelligence hiding in there somewhere. I know, I was as surprised as you!"

"Merlin's bright enough," said Tor. "And in fact, sire, given how often these creatures seem to knock you unconscious, he's probably seen more of them than even you have."

"Seen but not fought!" said Gryflet. "Be fair. All that lurking, hiding in the shadows does give Merlin a slight advantage."

"That's true enough!" said Tor, and thankfully they moved on to a different subject.

 

They ended the day about as close behind the sorcerer as they had been the evening before, as far as Arthur could judge it. Towards the end of the afternoon, they had come upon a young woman who had seen a man fitting the description use magic to steal a loaf from her cottage. ("His eyes _glowed_ , like gold," she had said, "and it whooshed across the empty air!") To let himself be so easily noticed, the man must have been getting either desperate or overconfident. Or perhaps he was simply thoughtless. Or a fool.

The knights were all pleased by such strong evidence that they were still following the right man. Arthur was surprised that they weren't more concerned that the sorcerer could apparently move objects as well as cast fires. Having seen and heard of what Merlin could do with the same ability, Arthur could not be so sanguine.

"Bread's not exactly as painful as fire," laughed Aglovale, when Arthur prodded him and a few others of the group on the subject. "And it's not very heavy, it's not as if we've found out he can lift our swords away."

Arthur wished he could explain to him that it wasn't really a matter of _weight_.

"He may be a sorcerer, but in the end, he's just one man," said Aglovale.

The others agreed. They honestly weren't troubled at all. They'd seen too many magic-users defeated at court, not knowing what secret assistance had been involved. If these men ever had to fight a truly powerful sorcerer on their own, Arthur thought suddenly, they wouldn't stand a chance.

That night they were lucky. Barely ten or twenty minutes after Arthur had first begun to think of bringing the party to a halt and making camp, they came upon the mansion house of an old landowner, Sir Howel: a knight who had served Arthur's father in both of their youths and was now settled, farming and collecting rents from his land, with a wife and two daughters. It was a small but sturdy and well-built place -- and almost anywhere would have been a welcome alternative to another night in the open. Howel readily offered his hospitality to the party.

He put out a good spread of food, and seemed genuinely glad of their company, urging them to eat and drink to their fill, regaling them with old tales of Arthur's father's many successes in battle: the dragons he had slain, the sorcerers defeated. He toasted to their success with a fervour to match that of his merry hearth -- "Just like the old days!" And he turned to Arthur and raised his goblet a second time. "You'll be as great a king as Uther is now. I can see it in you, you've got his spirit!"

Howel's smile was so broad, so open that Arthur had to smile back. Moments later, Merlin came forwards to pour more wine and Arthur felt Merlin's fingers touch his lower arm, just below the elbow, a brief, purposeful touch, as if to remind Arthur that he was not his father: not at all. Merlin's face was tired and drawn, but he still looked a kind of faith.

Arthur managed to persuade his host to put an end to the feasting soon after, pleading that his troop needed their rest. Howel shook his head in feigned dismay at such weakness, but did not seem really offended. He apologised that there was only the hay loft for the men, but Edith and Laudine could share his daughters' room; and there was one spare bedroom. Arthur had to take it -- as the prince it was his right and was what was expected -- and he was grateful for it. In part, if he was frank with himself, for the comfort. In main because Merlin would have to stay with him through the night to attend him. They would be away from the others and from any stray passers by, completely in private, for the first time since they had set off.

First, however, as they all departed Howel's great hall, Arthur found Laudine and asked her for a moment of her time. She assented quietly, and he drew her off to one corner of the room, watching to make sure that Edith was gone with the two girls before he began to speak.

"What do you think of her?" he said.

"Of Edith?" Laudine took some time considering her answer. "She's a good girl," she eventually said.

"That, er." Arthur felt awkward, in want of a good way to question Laudine as the almost-soldier whose role she currently filled without showing disrespect to the knight's daughter she still was and would continue to be. "That was a very cautious answer," he said.

"I apologise, sire." Laudine lowered her head in a half-bow.

"No, that-- Has she told you any secrets? Of course, I know you wouldn't withhold anything important, but if, perhaps-- _between women_ \--" Arthur waved a hand vaguely and hoped he'd managed to sound more sensitive and intelligent than he was feeling.

Laudine -- trained, no doubt, by her years in the company of the other ladies of the court -- maintained an expression of perfect calm and grace. "I'm afraid she hasn't told me anything," she said.

"No," Arthur said.

"But I do believe that she may be concealing something." Some indecipherably subtle expression flickered across Laudine's face. "The village, Oreald, was small. And Edith and this sorcerer, Morcant, were not distant in age."

"No. They weren't." Arthur breathed. And he realised, with relief and something that was very much not relief, that Laudine had been thinking along similar lines as himself.

"She might have professed to barely knowing him out of a misguided fear that anything more would bring her trouble. Or she might have disliked him," Laudine said.

"She wouldn't have hidden that."

"No, perhaps not. But then, they might really not have known each other well. It's possible."

"But not likely," Arthur said.

"No."

"And then-- she does seem--" Arthur tried to work out how to put so much of what he thought into words. He gave up and tilted his head to Laudine to let her fill in for him, slow and soft, in a way that only seemed to add authority to the words:

"She comes across as one unhappily determined to do her duty."

"Indeed," Arthur said.

"And I do wonder," Laudine added, after a pause, "why it is that she, in particular, was chosen as messenger. Though perhaps there is no particular reason against it."

"Her father was oddly insistent. And she looks like she's got something to prove. I should have seen it all back at the village, it's a kind of a test. Harsh and cruel and--" The extent of the real _cruelty_ of it struck Arthur forcibly as he spoke the word. "Far, far too cruel, if it's as bad as it might be. If she can prove herself, of course-- But if she _can't_ \--" He pressed his hand to his head, which only seemed to ache harder in response. "This is a mess."

"I apologise, sire," Laudine repeated. "I ought to have spoken of my suspicions before now."

"You can only have begun to suspect in the last day or so. It was already too late as soon as ten minutes after we left Oreald. We couldn't have gone back for someone else, it would have been too much delay."

"Even so--"

"Stop being so polite," Arthur interrupted, with a rough laugh and a shake of the head. "I'm too used to Morgana, d'you think she's polite to me?"

Laudine looked as though she didn't know what to say.

"She isn't," Arthur told her, and Laudine smiled.

"It may be that we won't need Edith," she offered.

"But we might." And even if they didn't, they'd still have to bring her along, just in case. The poor child of a girl would have to witness the whole thing. "And if we do-- can she do it?"

"You mean, can she identify him?"

"I mean, can she seal his death?"

"I think-- that she is determined that she will."

It was probably about as good an answer as Arthur was likely to get. "Thank you," he said. "For this. For coming along at all -- it's beyond any duty--"

Laudine bowed low.

"I won't keep you any longer," Arthur said.

Laudine replied with something polite and respectful that he barely heard, and then she left.

 

In the room Howel had had prepared for him, Arthur found Merlin lying on his back on top of the one, large, soft-looking bed, his arms nested round his head, his gaze thoughtful, fixed on one of the darker corners of the ceiling. The covers were looking rather rumpled about him, but he had at least taken off his boots. They stood, one crumpling at the shin, the other straight, by the nearest wall. Which, for Merlin, was quite extreme tidiness.

Arthur felt suddenly overcome, off-balance, with a wave of intense affection. Any more serious conversation, he decided, could _wait_. There would be time enough in the morning.

Closing the door behind him, Arthur walked up to the bed, caught Merlin's eye -- caught by him, incapable of not looking at him -- and gave him a shove. "I'm fairly sure this bed was intended for royalty only," he said. "There's a pallet on the floor for you."

"Hey! Oi!" Merlin scrambled up to sit, batting Arthur's hands away, and looked -- more surprised at first than anything else, shaking his head and scrubbing at his face, for once caught in a far more serious mood than Arthur himself. His mouth worked vainly for a couple of seconds, and then his voice stuttered to life in a fragmented laugh. He shook his head again, but smiled, huffing out another breath of laughter. "I'm not sleeping down there," he said.

"Well I'm not," said Arthur, toeing off his boots.

"No," said Merlin.

Arthur stripped off his tunic.

"I didn't think you would," said Merlin.

Arthur watched him watch Arthur's hands at the laces of his breeches. Merlin bent forwards, pressing the palms of his hands into the mattress as if about to crawl across and finish Arthur's work for him. Then Merlin pushed back, away from him, to lean against the headboard.

"I don't have any kind of plan," he admitted.

Arthur raised his brows. "Do we need one?"

"Yes," said Merlin. "We do."

Arthur got onto the bed, on his knees. "Then my plan is this." He cupped Merlin's face in his hand, fingers trailing over his cheek; he touched the pad of his thumb to the centre-point of Merlin's lower lip; he met Merlin's eyes, and filtered out the note of something imploring, something almost distrustful, he found there. _I love you_ , he thought. He kissed the corner of Merlin's mouth. He found the lower hem of Merlin's tunic and lifted it up and off, Merlin shakily raising his arms to allow him.

Arthur kissed Merlin's face, his neck, his shoulder. He felt Merlin bury his face in Arthur's hair: he felt the heat of Merlin's breath and the soft bump of his nose. Merlin wrapped his arms around Arthur's back, his hands cold in the night air.

"There must be something we can do," Merlin said. "I've thought about it -- I can save him in the short term; I really think I can -- but I don't know what to do beyond that."

"I don't know," said Arthur, murmuring it, mouthing back up Merlin's neck and towards his jaw. He drew Merlin away from the headboard so that they were kneeling opposite each other. He kissed Merlin's lips.

"Hey. Stop. Look, there must be something we can do," Merlin said. He half sighed, half groaned as Arthur trailed his hands down his sides. " _Something_ ," Merlin said, and moved closer. He kissed Arthur's mouth, a little awkwardly, lingeringly, a slow motion that was just on the edge of uncoordinated. He seemed on the verge of pulling away, or pressing yet closer -- or of both, if it had been possible. "I--" he said, against Arthur's lips. "You know that I can't, I can't let this--" And then he did press forwards, opening up Arthur's mouth and clutching at his hair, holding him deeper into the kiss, fingers pressing into Arthur's scalp.

Arthur pulled Merlin down with him onto the mattress. Merlin kissed him again and Arthur took it as a victory, gloried in it. He rolled them over so he was on top; and he fumbled and accidentally snapped the lacing's of Merlin's breeches -- cheaper than his own, poorly-made -- and Merlin said:

"You can't, I mean--" He lifted up for yet another deep kiss, hands back in Arthur's hair, comprehensively disordering it. "I'll do anything, to keep things right, to stop-- I'll do whatever it takes."

Arthur moved against him and drank in the sound of Merlin's breath catching.

" _Arthur_ ," Merlin said, and Arthur focussed on that.

 

In the morning, Arthur woke early and with an urgency in his blood. He turned over, brushing the covers aside, bent over Merlin, reached across, and took hold of the farther of Merlin's wrists.

"Mmf," said Merlin, blinking into a hazy wakefulness. "Uhm, I don't think there's time."

"No," Arthur ageed. He was reliving the night before, Merlin's words like a fixed point in his thoughts: _I can save him_ and _I'll do anything_. "Okay," he said. "What are you going to do?"

Merlin stared up at him.

"Today," Arthur said. "Today might be the day that we--" He closed his eyes. "We're close, now. And we're not far from the coast. We'll either catch him up or he'll get to the port."

"He _could_ escape, then," Merlin said, and Arthur could feel Merlin's thoughts forming: he could see the expression on his face, even without looking. "If something slowed us down. Or if you lost the trail."

Arthur drew his hand down from Merlin's wrist and over Merlin's own hand, fingers lingering on the bones of Merlin's knuckles, down his slender, bony fingers. "He won't have much chance of getting aboard a ship," Arthur said. "Even if we lose him." He tried to make the tone say quite how little a chance he believed it would be.

Merlin's fingers caught at Arthur's own -- he lifted his hand and pinned Arthur's forefinger tenuously between two of his, the flat of his forefingernail touching smooth and hard against Arthur's skin. Arthur opened his eyes to look at the grey of Merlin's face in the halflight as Merlin seemed to search for words.

Merlin said: "You don't think there's anywhere he can go. Or any way he can escape. More than temporarily."

"No. I don't think so."

Merlin let go Arthur's hand and shuffled to sit. "But we can give him some kind of chance. That's why-- that's what I thought before, that it's better if _we_ find him, and then I can do something. We can save him."

Arthur didn't know how.

"Or at least," Merlin said. "Anyway. Whatever you think, I still can't stand by. I can't just _watch_ while you-- are you--?" He broke off, paused, took a breath. "I have to do something."

"You can't."

"I can't _not_."

Arthur knelt up and retook Merlin's wrist, pinning it down by Merlin's side against the mattress.

"How _can I_ not?" said Merlin more loudly, voice rough and breaking.

"Be discreet," said Arthur -- quiet in example. But Merlin, of course, Merlin misinterpreted him.

"Should I let someone die to keep a secret?"

"I meant _now_. But if you want to know, _yes_ , you-- not-- you can't give yourself away for this damn hopelessness."

Merlin screwed up his face. "It's not hopeless."

"It is." It was. Almost entirely. Arthur thought he didn't really believe in the tiny flicker of hope he felt that somehow, this might all be solved.

"I can't accept that."

"No, maybe you can't." And something between them seemed to shift, as if settling into its more accustomed place. "I'm not sure you'd know how," Arthur said.

"I can't, anyway," said Merlin, more softly.

"If anyone sees what you are," Arthur said. "Then-- They're good people, but they hate magic."

"I know they do."

"I know."

"I--"

"So don't let it happen." Arthur gripped Merlin's wrist more tightly, and fixed his gaze. "Promise me, whatever you do-- Don't."

Merlin licked his lips. "I'll do my best."

"Merlin--"

" _Okay_. I will. I'll be discreet."

"Okay." It was probably the best Arthur could hope for. "Okay, I-- Okay." He let go of Merlin's wrist. He felt the most horrible, foolish urge to say _thank you_ , to say something more, even -- his mind swam with humiliation -- but thankfully, the only word he formed was another, "Okay."

"Okay." Merlin smiled, not with conviction, but it was still somehow something _good_. Resigned and wavering, but still a smile. "But," he said. "If I did. If I got found out, if I had to leave. I mean. You could go with me." He rushed that last sentence; or to Arthur's ears it was rushed. _Yucudgwithme_. "We could find a place for ourselves, somewhere else."

Arthur's heart beat pins-and-needles pricklingly. "No," he said.

"Yeah, no," Merlin said. "No. Yeah. I'd stay anyway. Destiny and all that -- I'd stay somewhere and hide myself." He smiled a different kind of smile and he shook his head. "You know _I_ could, or escape, I'd be okay. And I want to see you be king, to make sure of it. No matter what."

"I--" Arthur began. But he didn't know what he could say or where he could start. "We should get moving," he said. Then he found himself pinned down, pressed onto his back by no human force; that crushed-leaf magic-smell on the edge of his senses; Merlin surging over him to kiss him once, long, hard and deep.

"You have morning breath," Merlin muttered, somewhat breathless, as he drew away.

"Yeah, you too," said Arthur. He felt the magic lift from his body. He swallowed and sat up slowly in bed.

"Let's get you dressed and fed," said Merlin. "Long day ahead."

 

In fact, Arthur missed his breakfast to intercept the tray of food being brought to the women. He had scribbled a note for Laudine, and asked that the maidservant give it to her along with the food. His stomach growled, and he hoped Merlin would think to parcel something up for him to eat later. He thought of his men, happily eating and drinking in the hayloft.

After a couple of moments, Edith came out of the women's bedroom, alone. Arthur led her down to the small library of the mansion, which he reckoned was probably the best setting for what was to follow. The hall was too echoing for privacy, and was besides a lofty, intimidating place for a single peasant girl to be questioned in. And Merlin or perhaps one of the servants of the household might have need to be in the room where Arthur had slept.

He shut the library door and took in Edith's pale face, and he let himself doubt whether this was the right course of action. They might manage without her -- trick their suspected quarry into giving himself away, perhaps -- or if they didn't, then someone else would capture the man. Or Arthur would, later. His father would be disappointed. And it might cost Arthur something in whatever influence he could hold, if he failed in what his father had seemed so certain Arthur _ought_ to be able to do. He wondered if his father would suspect, or already suspected, or even knew the whole of the change in Arthur's sympathies. To Arthur, his secret felt so obvious that he sometimes thought everyone must see. He thought and had repeatedly reasoned that it was his duty to stay by his father, to remain in concealment, to stay his father's hand where he could and to wait-- for something better to come. But at times, he felt less and less sure of it; less and less sure that he had any effect and less and less sure of his fitness.

And so he considered, for a moment, if he couldn't send this girl away and have done. But then, for her, sent out -- as Arthur suspected -- to prove herself and to do what her people had decided was her duty: a failure could ruin her. And if she had to be a part of this, he thought, she might as well do it believing that it was right.

"You've kept something from us," he began; and the look on her face confirmed it. He decided to be general in pursuance to give her space to confess. Not to give her anything specific to deny or to which she could limit herself. It would be better if she didn't see him as someone she'd managed to deceive.

He said, "You can redeem yourself if you tell me everything now."

She shivered, and so he offered her his jacket. She took it. She looked up at him, red leather setting off her childish yellow hair: she looked lost and depthlessly afraid. Arthur thought, no, I've wrecked it, she's lost. Then she nodded sharply, once, then again, and a glimmering of pride touched the colour of her eyes. She pressed her lips together. She looked ready to speak on one more nudge of encouragement.

"Come on," said Arthur. "Talk."

And so she did: "We were going to be married," she said.

And it was as Arthur had suspected. She had been involved with the man. Walking out -- that sort of thing, and probably far more -- with all the village's knowledge. There had been a general understanding, in that village way, that a wedding was to follow. The man had owned enough land and had good enough prospects, Arthur could imagine that Edith's father had lowered his ambitions a touch in the face of her preference and grudgingly approved. And of course, upon the discovery that Edith's lover had been a sorcerer, it had been the practical thing to do, the prudent thing, the best way to show that she had never been his accomplice: to send her off to take the largest part available to her in his death.

She had kept quiet for fear that Arthur would refuse to bring her along and would ask for someone else. Which he certainly would have. But she was determined to prove herself. And she saw herself as a representative of her village, felt they would all be under suspicion if she failed. Arthur was struck by the huge risk her father had taken in his decision, and the faith he must have that she would not flinch from what was asked of her. Then again, for her to stay living there with the weight of mistrust upon her would have been immensely difficult. Probably intolerable to her father, given what Arthur had glimpsed of Werian's haughty and petty pride.

"In any case," Arthur said. "I can't send you back now. It's too late."

She bent her back in a very low bow. "Sire, I'm sorry." She straightened up. "But I won't fail. I won't care about a sorcerer. I do understand."

"Yes," said Arthur.

"He's nothing to me. He deceived us all. I know that, he's _evil_."

"Yes."

"All magic is. And it's my duty to the King and to you and to the kingdom to do this. And it's my duty to my father. And it's my duty to Oreald. And it's a _good_ duty, and I understand the law, and what is right."

It was, in substance if not in form, the lecture Arthur had intended to deliver to her on the subject. He had wanted to stiffen her resolve and help keep her from faltering when the crucial moment came. She seemed to be doing a good job of it herself. And if he wondered how entirely convinced she might be, even so, she sounded far more so than he could be.

He still felt that he should say something, should say whatever he could find to say to make her as sure as was possible. He felt that the only thing he could do for this girl was to give her the kind of easy conscience that was not his own. And so Arthur dredged up one of the few elements she had not already covered.

"Sorcerers have done great harm to this kingdom," he said. He thought he heard the words spoken in his father's voice. "You must remember that. They have killed hundreds of innocent people -- people just like yourself. My father brought a time of great darkness to an end when he vanquished magic from this kingdom." Arthur tried to decide that Edith looked full of respect, faith, certainty. "All magic is dangerous," he said. "No sorcerer can be allowed to live."

"No," she said, "he can't. He has to die."

Arthur wanted to check for signs of doubt in her voice, her face, but was taken up with suppressing his own flinch. He wondered whether it cost her much to speak as she did. But perhaps it helped her to do so -- and then, she might even entirely believe her own words.

"Good," said Arthur. "Remember that. Do your duty and do what is right."

He dismissed her soon after, ordered her off to eat a few bites of breakfast as swiftly as she could whilst Arthur went to be armed and to go over their plans with the knights. Cador clapped him on the shoulder as Arthur joined them.

"Today." Cador grinned. "I have a good feeling about today. We won't let some dock worker steal our glory."

Arthur grinned back. "Let's hope not." And he looked about for Merlin, who was waiting for him with his sword.

 

It had showered overnight, and when they set off, the ground was sodden and sparkling. The wet grass crushed beneath the horses' feet released a fresh, green, spring-morning smell, full of all the life Arthur thought he could almost feel thrumming deep within the land. The daylight was hazy -- mild and forgiving -- the sky overcast, the sun a blurring gleam through the clouds. The air was heavy with the thought of more rain. The morning drew on towards noon, Arthur's troop dividing and regrouping, making their pursuit with a steady, unfailing progress. Eventually, it began to patter. Just the soft suggestion of rain, touching against Arthur's bare cheeks and spotting the skin of his bright bay.

The damp began to sink in to Arthur's clothes, pressed between his armour and his flesh, and he began to feel uncomfortable. He glanced back and forth over his men. They were riding in double file now, down a narrowing path through the deep browns of recently-tilled spring fields. He caught a slight squirm in the saddle, a bunching and unbunching of shoulders, a tightness about Tor's neck and jaw; Hector and Gryflet bent to one another, the picture rather than the sound of muttered discussion. A break might soon be in order. They could afford it, Arthur thought.

Merlin, beside him, was faring rather better. Without the weight of armour, his clothing loose and untrapped, of course, he would be. And he looked it, too, his expression unguarded as he took in the land and the specks of people scattered about, droplets of water caught in his hair. There was a slope and crumple about his posture that was never quite right, but he still rode well enough, well-practised.

Merlin caught Arthur looking at him and smiled back, as if there were nothing to it. As if all had been forgotten, and they were transplanted into a different time. Arthur was grateful for it.

"Does it take work to look so brainless?" he asked.

"Oh, it's very difficult," Merlin replied, with mock gravity. "I'm disguising my massive intellect."

"Extremely well, it would seem."

"I'm just that good." Merlin rubbed at his face. "Been raining for a while now," he said.

" _Has it_? How observant of you. Be careful, or that intellect will start to show through."

Merlin looked Arthur up and down, a little more seriousness now edging its way into his face. "I am _always_ careful," he said. He closed his eyes, and his mouth moved, forming silent words. Because he was looking for it, Arthur saw the slight glow at the closing-place of Merlin's eyelids -- like glimpsing the light of a fire round the edges of a closed door. It took him a moment to realise his clothes beneath his armour had dried out.

"You're never careful enough," Arthur said. He nudged his horse a little closer to Merlin's.

Merlin opened his eyes and he looked -- attached. It seemed to come so easily to him; the _tug_ upon Arthur's heart was out of proportion.

Arthur thought over their earlier conversation and felt torn and frustrated. Merlin, so committed to be reckless, and with such straightforwardness of judgement that it bordered on unreality. Arthur had thought before now how swiftly he himself might slip from one side to the other of Merlin's barricade-straight sense of right. Now Arthur tried not to add to that thought: and how soon. He didn't like that inkling of fear, and he didn't like the way it mixed with the ridiculous, effortless influence of a smile and a spell to draw him to think as Merlin thought -- that Arthur should do what he could for this man he was hunting and let the consequences be what they might.

Perhaps they could do it. Defy everything, fight, fight Arthur's own men and get this sorcerer safe on a ship. And then leave themselves, together, the two of them. Just as Merlin had said. They could leave Camelot for somewhere in the far north -- Arthur had heard, once, that there was land there for the taking. It was not an easy life, but a man could build a home, clear land for crops, grow barley or oats. Keep chickens, a goat or cow for the milk. He could lead an uncomplicated existence.

The idea was nonsense. To save one life Arthur would lose the opportunity to save many more. And Arthur could never leave Camelot, which held all the duty and identity and _place_ he had ever had. It was impossible. And Merlin-- Arthur glanced again at Merlin's face. There was no way Merlin could really pack it all in, forget prophecy, forget all his unseeable power and settle down with an ex-prince turned peasant farmer. Arthur probably wouldn't even make a very good farmer. He knew little enough of agriculture, beyond how much you could expect a man to produce over the year and how much of that it was reasonable to tax him. What would be the point of it? And what would Arthur be to Merlin, or to anyone, even to himself, if he wasn't the man who fought and led and might one day be king?

 _When you are king_. Arthur had heard the words often enough, and seen them in Merlin's -- and in others' -- thoughts still oftener. He swallowed down the bitter taste in his mouth and put aside what those words meant for his father's place in others' minds. He did want at least the brighter half of what they wanted. To be a good king and a good, loyal leader of his people -- there was scarcely anything he wanted more. Well enough for him and his knights to have rhapsodised on wine-soaked evenings as to the many unknown joys of a simpler life. The next day they had returned with pleasure to their skill in arms, their sparring and training, their one-upmanship and plots and intrigues for status. Their joy in their ever-increasing renown: the thought that they could go, it seemed anywhere, and be _known_ , spoken of, admired. They embraced their entangled, rich men's lives with a vigorous love. This was the way that they were alive, and it was far more to them than some half-hashed passion for fantasies wrought upon too many glasses of their good, rich men's drink.

Arthur drew a little away from Merlin, who was silent, staring back into the distance. Perhaps thinking of plans and dreams of his own. The drizzle had grown more insistent, but Arthur did not seem to get any more wet. He looked to the sky, trying to judge the position of the sun through thick, pale cloud, and he called to mind the rough knowledge he had of this area. In a little while, he decided, they would turn off towards a good place to stop, and take some of the food supplied by Howel's wife.

Over the rest of the day, the rain faded, the sky clearing as the party neared upon the coastline. Arable land became pasture, the green and brown smells of the land joining and slowly quietened by the rugged salt-freshness of the sea. Where the land ended they turned east along the cliff-tops, the sun beginning to get low behind them in the west, and their quarry -- it was agreed -- now not far ahead at all. Certainly not far enough to make it to the nearest port before nightfall.

 

They found the man.

It felt good to have his sword in his hand as Arthur watched the unnatural swerve of Laudine's arrow and Hector and Gryflet's crossbow bolts -- all three on target exactly for the sorcerer's head until one knife-slash split of a second, a stream of whispered words sounding too loud near Arthur's side. Merlin's voice, so distinct and familiar. Arthur thought for one moment that everyone about must know who had cast the spell. He watched the sorcerer ahead struggle to re-cast the fire he must have been on the brink of hurling in Arthur's own direction. The man's magic seemed gone, dowsed -- he spoke quick and rough, he waved his hands, and he stepped back a little, back into his shelter, as the air remained empty before his fingers.

Laudine was taking aim again, Hector and Gryflet reloading. Arthur himself had advanced, closing upon his enemy, tense and ready to dodge aside at the first sign of attack. He knew exactly which motions to follow. He was trained for this: he had been training all his life. In a half-second, Laudine would shoot again. Then the crossbowmen would. Then, if they did not succeed, Arthur or Cador or Aglovale, both also advancing, would get the thing done. The man was dead. He was as good as dead already.

The man was staring at something over Arthur's shoulder -- behind Arthur and a little to one side. The man had stopped his chanting. Time seemed slowed down as his mouth moved slightly, now more in a kind of dazzled understanding than in spell-casting, and a kind of gold-yellow glow spread over him.

Time seemed thick and heavy. The man stopped staring at Merlin, lowered his head, and -- moving at a blurred, inhuman speed that showed what he had been granted -- he ran. And at first, Arthur thought of nothing beyond that Merlin had never told him he could do that for other people. And Arthur wondered if Merlin had even known he could before this instant.

Arthur heard the twang of another shot, another arrow, and he knew it would miss. The man was cutting a path a little way to Arthur's right, heading inland -- Arthur wondered how far he would get, how long Merlin could keep this up. He passed Arthur, and Arthur turned and gave chase. Pitted against that kind of speed, he felt ridiculously, humiliatingly slow. He glimpsed Merlin: sat down, bent forwards, heaving breaths. And Arthur took in other, scared, bewildered faces around him. Edith looking whiter than ever.

The others had reacted, but more slowly than Arthur. Less used, of course, to being around magic. And so Arthur was closest upon the man; and when the man stumbled on an unevenness in the ground and fell hard, face-forwards, and too hard and completely for any speed to help him, it was Arthur who closed in and stood over the man as he clutched the grass and tried to get to his knees. The man fell down again, shaking. He seemed to have injured himself in his fall. The glow had gone: Merlin either exhausted or, perhaps, trying something different. Merlin would never give up.

The man's back was stretched out and unguarded upon the ground. Arthur felt the eyes of his people all around him, his father's orders and his father's grudging pride. He felt what he was trained to do and what he had agreed and given himself over to. He drove his sword home.

The man made very little sound. A choking sort of gurgle or cough. Arthur braced his foot against the man's back and pulled out his sword. He raised it and, as the body stilled, he sliced off the man's head in a stroke.

 

He knew they would have to go inland to find somewhere sheltered to make camp, and preferably soon, before it got much darker, but Arthur gave the party a few moments to breathe. He needed to breathe. He left the body -- they would leave the body here, to rot or be eaten by whatever creatures might prowl the area. They would take only the head back to Arthur's father. There was a cloth bag -- Arthur thought Tor had it -- which had been brought for the purpose. He left Tor to deal with his duty.

Merlin was still sat down upon the floor, but Arthur saw Cador go over to him and offer a hand.

"How'd you end up down here?"

"Ah, I don't know." Merlin's voice sounded a little thick. He accepted the hand, and Cador heaved him up.

"That was about the strangest thing I've ever seen." Cador grinned and shrugged. "Sorcery. You'd think they'd be able to defend themselves better than that. Still, I suppose it's good for us that they can't!"

"Yeah, good thing," said Merlin. He seemed restrained. Tired, but not obviously-- not anything that would cause problems.

Arthur felt uncomfortably self-aware, standing, staring, too interested. He wiped his sword on the grass to clean it and went to say a few words to Edith, because he supposed he owed it to her. Laudine was with her, but tactfully withdrew on Arthur's approach, winding her way off to the highpoint of the cliff's edge to gaze about her. And it occurred to Arthur now that of course, she would have seen far less of Camelot's land and landscape than any of the men here. She must have seen little of the sea.

He congratulated Edith on her loyalty and thanked her. She had done her duty well, he said. She looked a little grim, a little lost, and she was looking anywhere but in the direction of the body. Arthur had a sense of her slowly running out of the certainty she had worked up in herself, and at a time when she still felt it was needed. The clear sound of her voice -- _It's him_ \-- re-echoed in his mind. He wondered if she had watched as he killed the man: he imagined her forcing herself to do it. Laudine might know. Arthur doubted he would ask her.

"You will be well rewarded, well recompensed," he said. From his own funds, if his father refused it.

"Thank you, sire." She bowed, deeply -- she looked as though she found relief in it. A nudge to push away her responsibility for what she had done.

"You did what was right," he said stiffly.

"Thank you. I, that-- Thank you." The breeze coming in from the coast had picked up, and it brushed a strand of her hair across her face; she shook her head and managed to shake the strand away. "I understand the law," she said.

Perhaps for her, that was all right and wrong came down to. Following the law, staying clear of the king's wrath, keeping your place in your own little community and, if it was what that community and your survival required, offering up one of your own. Perhaps all she had said of evil and duty and sorcery had been what she knew the situation required that she say, or perhaps she believed it, or perhaps the truth lay somewhere in between. A muddied state of mind -- Arthur's own, once; and in some ways it was still his own -- caught between belief and practicality and the unthinking, grimy suppression of any unbelief that might make everything clear.

He saw Edith glance off at the hermit's hut, where the man had been sheltered. At the aged, pathetic wreck of it. He thought he saw her shiver -- perhaps he hoped he did.

"Forget all of this," he said. "Lead a good life. You're a good girl."

She looked to him as though she believed she would never forget. But she bowed, she thanked him, she agreed with him; he dismissed her and she went off to Laudine.

Laudine placed her hand on the girl's shoulder and the two exchanged a few words, seeming intimate. The sound of their voices carried as an indistinct murmur to where Arthur stood. He wondered now, when it made no difference, if Laudine hadn't lied the previous day as to exactly how much she knew. A little bit of feminine loyalty. He wondered which of the alternatives he would prefer: for the two to be closer or less close than they appeared.

The squires had brought round the horses, and all seemed ready for the party to move on. It was getting far too dark for them to hesitate longer. Arthur gave a sign, and Merlin -- for once efficient and obedient -- led Arthur's horse to him and stood in silence as Arthur mounted. Merlin's face had been impassive, but up close to Arthur he became as grim as Edith, eyes stormy and full of feeling. Arthur relived in sense-memory the moment his sword had pierced into the sorcerer's flesh: the shift in things as he had stabbed out the man's life. He felt disorientated atop his horse as Merlin walked away.

His father would be pleased with his day's work, Arthur thought. There was that, at least. An extra hold on his father's trust, maybe a little extra influence. A little extra weight in Arthur's favour. And Arthur wanted that: and he wanted his father's pride. To play the good son and heir, and to fit into the place he felt his life had laid out for him. And then, he wanted to be a better man than that. He could be better than a murderer. He imagined the difference: to stand tall and steadfast to his idea of right, rather than bowing down to his father and his father's court, to all the wrong his father had taught his kingdom was right. Arthur loved his father. Arthur understood the law and exactly how little it would change whilst his father was on the throne. He understood the depth and strength of his father's support amongst nobles and peasantry alike -- how unchallengeably he was king. And Arthur wanted to be king himself.

As they rode off, Arthur looked to the bloodied bag at Tor's saddle, in which the dead sorcerer's-- in which _Morcant's_ head had been placed. Arthur cursed himself a thousand times.

 

They made camp somewhere a little in land, sheltered beneath the sparse trees at the edge of deeper forestland. They made a fire and arranged a watch. Laudine seemed to be taking care of Edith, nudging her to eat and then helping her to settle down for the night. Arthur was glad it was not his responsibility.

Merlin was quiet, grim, ghostlike -- the men put it down to tiredness and unease at the "strange" magic they had all seen that day. He remained quietly obedient to orders. He seemed elsewhere. He bedded down near to Arthur, as usual for this sort of situation, and Arthur tried not to be too relieved by what might, after all, be only habit.

It took Arthur a long time to get to sleep. His mind was too full: of what he had done, of what he ought to have done, what he could say to Merlin and what he should do. Impossible plans. All the impossible ways he could convince his father to change or-- But kings did not retire. Or even if some did, kings like his father did not. Arthur knew that his father loved his kingdom and his kingship with an iron, unshakeable kind of love.

Arthur turned over to face where Merlin lay. Merlin had fallen asleep swiftly, that softening about him coming almost the moment he had lain down. Of course, he was exhausted. Arthur wished he could reach out to him, to touch, to test how things were between them now. He listened to the thrum of his pulse. Each heartbeat-thump seemed like the sinking of a leaden weight on one hook of a scales, each time a half-centimetre lower. Drifting off, finally, Arthur half dreamed and half imagined a different world. Lit up by Merlin's magic, a place that shone with what was right and good; a sword in Arthur's hands that felt like it was part of him and that he would never have to put to its mortal purpose; a throne, a crown, a court without intrigue; a table full of knights he could trust always and without question. Arthur slept and dreamed.

 

He awoke in the night to find Merlin gone. The man on watch, Gryflet, was asleep against a tree, and the sorcerer's head, in its bag, was gone as well. Arthur could make out a glow in the distance, from the part of the clifftop where the hermitage was. No one woke as Arthur left the camp. From the outside, by some illusion, his and Merlin's sleeping bags still looked as if they were occupied -- another thing Arthur hadn't known Merlin could do. He turned to look back when he was a little way off, and threw a few small stones at Gryflet's tree to rouse the man up. Best not to leave the rest of the party unguarded. And then Arthur made his way in the direction of the fire.

Merlin had built up a great, roaring blaze: something glorious, overloaded with meaning, upon the cliff-top. Once he neared, Arthur began to make out the low, almost liquid sound of flames licking about dry branches. The smoke was blowing to the east, along the coastline, but Arthur could still catch the smell of it, and thought he could make out a thread of that sharp, meatlike note that comes with burning flesh.

Closer still, the scent was stronger, and Arthur could feel the heat of the fire and see its distortions upon the air. He almost missed the shape of Merlin himself, off to one side, silhouetted in the hermitage doorway. Just another shadow in the night. Arthur came closer still towards the pyre, the heat of it making him sweat, until he had to screw his eyes against the smell of ash and the aching brightness of the light. He knelt, and tried to believe that he was honouring the man he had killed -- that there was some recompense that could be done to the dead. After some minutes longer, he came away.

"Is there a real point to this thing?" he asked Merlin.

"He deserved a better end," Merlin said. He didn't move from where he was sat, head leant against the ragged stonework, and didn't object when Arthur got down beside him.

"I was supposed to bring some evidence of death to my father."

"Now you can't," Merlin said.

"No."

"Perhaps you could convince him that sorcerers turn to dust when they die." The words had bite, but not as much as they might have.

"I think he would already know," Arthur said, his heart aching.

"Yeah, I guess so."

"Merlin--" Arthur began.

"I can't believe that this happened. I don't want to believe this happened. I can't-- I don't--" Merlin heaved a shuddering breath that could have been a soft, bitter laugh, or could have been the suppression of a sob. "I don't see how this could be. But-- you would have done something though, right? If you could, you _would_ , you would have done something. _Arthur_."

"I would have," Arthur said weakly.

"But it's not enough."

"No. It's not." Arthur choked on the words even as he agreed.

He got no immediate answer. In the quiet, he leant forwards, hands on his knees, and watched as the fire began to collapse about the middle. The centre went dark, too compressed to burn, whilst the flames scattered and rose about the edges. Merlin lifted one hand and held it, fingers outstretched and a little spread, in the air. On a word, the fire tightened and intensified, sucking back in to the heart of the pyre, raging, feeding on magic.

For one final time in that day and night, Arthur thought of the strong, painful love he bore his father. Of his father's lined face, of the weight in his eyes, the flicks of pride Arthur had seen, miracle-rare, as his father looked upon him. He let the thought become obscured, clouded over behind a thousand other thoughts.

Merlin lowered his hand and set it down upon the stone. The fire altered, grew more natural. It lost some of the madness of its fervour. Arthur spent some time listening to the sound of burning.

"This should never have happened," Merlin said at last. "I should never have let this happen. I should have found something more."

" _You_ did-- more than I even knew you could. You can't blame yourself."

"I know there must have been something more. He still died, and you still--" Merlin cut himself off, shook his head. "Oh god," he murmured, very low. "Oh god."

"I killed him," Arthur said. His finger tips stang, half numb. He took a breath before he said the other thing he had to say. "I'll never let anything like this happen again. I swear it. I'll do everything." He thought he felt Merlin study and try to read his face in the firelight, but Arthur couldn't turn to look. He looked out instead, beyond the fire and out to sea. "If I can," he said, "I'll change everything."

"I know," said Merlin. "You will." He placed his hand over one of Arthur's -- metal-cold and bony-fingered, sealing a hard, silent pact. Arthur covered it with his free hand, locking it between his two, and the curve of his shoulders made it natural that he should bend his head down.

"Arthur--" Merlin began. He shifted and leant in and close, breath tickling on Arthur's face. His features blurred into indistinctness: shaded eyes dark blanks on pale skin, the odd flatness and ridge where forehead became nose, a smudged darkness of hair. "We'll--"

 _\--be all right_ , Arthur's mind filled in. It seemed the most likely continuation. Merlin himself remained silent.

"We'll be all right," Arthur offered up into the night.

Merlin shook his head, _no_ , but said, "Yeah. Yeah, okay." He kissed Arthur dryly, a brief scratch of skin against skin. He whispered something, and Arthur felt the ground beneath him grow softer, the sea wind less brisk. The pyre blazed strong. Arthur could feel the heat from its flames.

"We'll be okay," Merlin said. "We'll make things right."


End file.
